Adventures, Culinary and Otherwise of a New Life In a Small Town

Rainy Days, Shirley Jackson and a Tiny Horse called Win

Sitting down to breakfast of Ezekiel Bread with Avocado on one slice & Tahini & Honey on the other, very satisfying getting both savory & sweet without having anything too bad for me. I did burn my toast, but I scraped it.. .and I had a distinct memory of the smell of scraped burnt toast from childhood. I like slightly burnt toast, I like the taste of burnt things. Do you? What do you do when you burn your toast? Does anyone just throw it away?? I mean as long as its edible… is toast one of those things that you just eat no matter what or does it have to be perfect?

So many things happened since my last post.

So first I had a amazing birthday Dinner at Ports of Italy in Boothbay Harbor, I wish I took pictures but I put the phone away for the evening. I’ll tell you what we had though. Got there a bit early- it was a beautiful drive and we kept looking at each other like -Can you believe we live here!!!- Had a cocktail at the bar and caught up with Sante, the owner, he’s from Puglia and has a gorgeous shirt collection. Anyway I was thrilled he remembered us, we’d only been twice before over the course of 2 years, but each time we closed the place, also the median age in most of Maine is about 106, so I guess we stand out.

Outdoor seating at Ports of Italy…

Porchetta and Antipasto

A suggestion, next time you go to an Italian restaurant , a good one, try allowing your meal to go like this(if you are 2, if you are more double the amount):

Antipasto: Pick 2- share them

Primi (Pasta) pick 1 and share a full plate or if the do halves pick 2, some places do that.

Secondi Split 1, and get a Contorini if they sound good

Digestivos, Espresso, Dolci or Formaggio.

This is what I think of as the perfect way to pace a meal, Taste a lot without eating too much. And if you do it right dinner should take about an hour and a half, which is as it should be, me, I’d like a two- two and half hour dinner with a stroll between courses but thats hard on a restaurant.

Everyone sang Happy Birthday to me which I normally hate but it was charming, even the table across the room, where I was certain the woman’s resting bitch face was cast in stone, smiled and sang. After dinner, walking to the car we could smell and hear the ocean, and even though we got lost drove through the woods for an hour it was still a great night.

After all the Birthday hoopla died down, we had our very first real weekend here at home in Maine, and a three day one at that. On Saturday we discovered that opening a bank account can be fun thanks to Clover at Bath Savings, then we went to Crystal Springs Farm for the Saturday Farket. I saw a dog that looked so much like my childhood dog that tears sprang to my eyes and I had to force myself not to run and bury my face in her fur, and I bought mussels from a man who looked exactly like my Poppa Hy, except for his bright blue eyes, my Poppa Hy had one green eye and one blue eye. He must have wondered why I was so happy to see him, but there was a line so I’ll save the conversation for next week.

Then we took our two $10 gift certificates that the bank gave us for opening our accounts (what a nice bank!) and headed out to Buck’s Naked BBQ a local BBQ chain that boasted the best Bloody Mary ever…what better way is there to spend $20 free dollars on a Saturday at 11am??

Was is the best Bloody Mary ever? Well it came with a a Rib, so yeah it was pretty spectacular. We split Buffalo Brussels Sprouts, which were ok, not something I’d order again, I thought they’d be different..crispier I guess. After much deliberation because I wanted everything on the menu, and once my gnawing hunger was abated by the rib on my cocktail… I got the Pork Belly Tacos instead of Half a chicken and an order of mac & cheese… it was a much more lady like portion of food, and I did not feel full or piggy afterwards. Christian got Pulled Pork & Fries. It was good, I just don’t love pulled pork, I do love chunks of smoked pork butt sprinkled with flaky salt & spicy vinegar, but no one ever serves it that way. -sad face-.

A Bigfatjerkface sat next to us at the bar and engaged us in the wrong conversation (Something about why should he have to pay taxes while Obama ruins our country and hates god- I dunno , I wasn’t really listening ). He did order a pretty amazing looking fried Chicken Thigh Sandwich, which he sent back because it was dark meat – I’m not kidding-also he made a big point of praying before he ate, just to show us JewsDemocratsAtheists the right way to be I guess. His silent friend got an order of Burnt Ends that looked amazing and ample, and I want to try them next time. Sucks that he kind of took the wind out of our sails because he was so toxic.

Our day continued on to a wine buying trip to Trader Joes in Portland…what a joy that was ! Bulked up on a case of assorted house wines for under a $100, including a wine called Pontificus, that Aunt Sandy uses as her house wine and its umm $8.99 a bottle for a really tasty cote du rhone style, also bought a lovely Minervois for only $11.99 !!! YEAH SUCK IT PLCB…(Pennsylvanian only joke).

Then we drove over to Micucci’s , it was well…after years of DiBruno it’s hard to not be disappointed by anything short of Eataly. It was fine, a little pricy and I was not fond of the Ricotta from Vermont ..way watery..whey too watery ( and now an obscure cheese joke), also it was really expensive and they did not slice cheese to order nor did they have guanciale. Thier fennel sausage was very good, but its not theirs it comes from a place called Metro. However the pizza and sandwiches that were coming out of the back looked ridiculous good, so a reason to return.

Our day wound up at Reny’s, where we bought a bunch of random crap including an American flag, wine glasses, san marzano tomatoes and boxer shorts. And we shared a black raspberry ice cream cone in the parking lot.

Saturday night ended listening to records, eating Mussels, Steak & Corn and drinking the Minervois and having a long conversation about the State of the World and the future of the Universe.

Sunday was CHORES then Dinner with our neighbors which was super fun… though I had the beginnings of a throat tickle which I hoped was allergies.

Memorial Day… Was bright and sunny and I was sick…full on runny nose, coughing sneezing Nyquil ad sick… but we went to the parade anyway, and by going to the parade I mean I sat on a bench on the green and watched from afar sucking on a huge iced coffee, dressed like some sort of demented Olsen twin in boots, an extra long skirt, reflective aviators, messy hair, black eyeliner, and long scarf.

It was idyllic small town moment, the band was playing American standards, children were laughing and running – amazingly there were very few iphones & ipads in sight- well except for the one middle aged couple in understated yet obviously expensive jeans, sneakers and casual tops, he was flashing his ipad about taking pictures of the sky I guess, and she was squinting at her iphone ostentatiously they way people do – Just proves the point that there are assholes everywhere.

Anyhow… watching all this in my post Nyquil mucus-sy haze I could help but think of Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery, and numerous Stephen King books regarding evil lurking in small Maine towns. At any moment I thought they are going to call up some random person and stone them or throw them in a ditch or tie them to a rock in the ocean. As far as I know none of these things happened, I say as far as I know because just as I was thinking about how great it would be if it was the asshole with his ipad getting tied to the rock I turned to my left and saw * GASP* ——

This was an actual real live tiny horse only inches from me greedily gobbling clover. My attention for the next 2 hours was almost solely on Win, the tiny horse. Win was in the parade with his equally tiny owner Sue, who rode behind him in a tiny cart, whilst wearing her father’s WWII army jacket & jaunty hat. I got my husband to give her a ride to pick up her trailer in the next town over so I could spend more time gazing at Win while he ignored me completely. Come to think of it when I was in 9th grade I was madly in love with a senior named Win…Win Peniston III, he ignored me too.

Eventually Win and Sue went home to Woolrich , Christian and I went to Bailey Island so pay our respects to Uncle Carl…and fine man with a great appetite and the sparkliest blue eyes I’ve ever seen, Uncle Carl passed last year, and if it wasn’t for him we wouldn’t be here, he was the one who started the Adams family annual Maine pilgrimage.

Lilies of the Valley from My Neighbor Randi

Afterwards I succumbed to a polar vortex of cold + ladytime issues and lay on my couch until this very morning, its been raining here… lots of rain yesterday, though I hear the sun is going to come out later, maybe I’ll feel like a walk or something. My throat is still pretty scratchy & sore and I have not slept well at all…partially because STUPID FARRAH gets up in the middle of the night and meows for hours at the baby birds who live in our bathroom vent, but also because coughing sneezing cramps etc….

Oh yeah there is a family of birds who live in our bathroom fan vent.. we hear them chirping, its kind of like Piip-Show, but not as fancy. There are also a lot of spiders in our house, but I’ll take spiders over waterbugs anyday.

Cats Exploring the Yard

This is this weeks menu:

Monday BBQ w Meg & Joe

Cheeseburgers & Hot Dogs

Potato Salad

Cole Slaw

Cherries & Watermelon (MEGAN what a godsend!)

Tuesday

Chicken Potpie with Swiss Chard

Beet Salad w Hazelnuts

Wednesday

Shrimp Curry + White Rice

Peas

Thursday

Asian Grilled Steak Salad w Mango

Friday

Homemade Sausage, Kale, Caramelized Onion Pizza

Saturday- Farmer’s Market Dinner

Pasta with Green Garlic

Grilled Fish TBD

Greens

Sunday Supper

Radishes & Pate

Pollo Alla Matone

Rosemary Potatoes

Bitter Greens or Asparagus

Recipe

My Best Potato Salad

I generally am not a fan of potato salad, its just meh to me especially the vinegar-y ones. But this is the best I’ve ever had, and the only I’ll go back for 2nds of. I first had this potato salad during what could be called a lost weekend, I entertained an Irish Chef over a long 4th of July weekend, at one point we had lunch with his family, his mother served this alongside cold lobster…

Serves 4

2 large Starchy Potatoes ( Kennebec, Idaho or Russet work great-it has to be a starchy potato, waxy ones won’t get the right texture)

1/2 Cup Mayonnaise – Homemade is best but otherwise Hellman’s or Bestfoods DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT MIRACLE WHIP!